The present invention relates to a filling valve which permits a combined use in a filling of a carbonated beverage and a filling of a non-carbonated beverage, and in particular, to a filling valve which is suitable for a filling operation under a clean environment.
A filling valve which permits a combined use in a filling of a carbonated beverage and a filling of a non-carbonated beverage is known in the art (see, for example, Japanese Laid-Open Patent Application No. 2004-136927). The filling valve disclosed therein comprises a valve housing which is centrally formed with a filled liquid passage communicating with a filled liquid supply piping extending from a tank of filled liquid and which includes a bottom end in which a filling nozzle is mounted. A communication of the filled liquid passage is allowed or interrupted by opening or closing a liquid valve. The filling valve also comprises a bottle mouth gasket which seals the mouth of a vessel during a filling operation, an air cylinder for moving the bottle mouth gasket up and down, a flow meter which detects the quantity of liquid filled into the vessel, and a gas exhaust passage formed within the valve housing.
In the filling valve, an opening of the gas exhaust passage is located outside an opening (liquid discharge port) of the filling valve, and when a carbonated filling operation is to take place, a liquid is filled into the vessel through the filling nozzle from the filled liquid passage which is centrally formed within the value housing while the mouth of the vessel is sealed by the bottle mouth gasket and while exhausting gas within the vessel through the gas exhaust passage which is formed outside the filled liquid passage.
In an arrangement as in the filling valve disclosed in the above citation in which a gas exhaust passage, a counter-passage and the like are formed within the valve housing, it is difficult to form these passages in a linear alignment, but the passages must be folded in different directions. During manufacture, a plurality of bores are formed into the valve housing in different directions so that they can communicate with each other within the housing, and pins are forced into undesired portions as a press fit to block such bores. With this arrangement, there arises a risk that fungus beds may form in clearances formed between pins which are disposed as a press fit and internal surfaces of bores formed in the valve housing, and therefore, this technique is inapplicable when the filling operation should take place in a clean environment.
For a filling operation of a non-carbonated beverage, it is an extensively applied practice to attach a screen to the distal end of the nozzle for purposes of suppressing a formation of bubbles and removing foreign matters. However, it is a time taking operation to attach screens to a number of nozzles. Accordingly, it may be contemplated to replace the nozzles by those which have screens attached to the distal end thereof. However, when the gas exhaust passage is formed within the housing, there remains the gas exhaust passage in the housing if the nozzles are changed alone, requiring a cleansing and a sterilization of such locations. This is undesirable in an arrangement which performs a filling operation in a clean environment where the number of locations which must be cleansed should be reduced as much as possible.